


symptoms of madness

by nigiyakapepper



Category: Songbirds of Valnon - L. S. Baird
Genre: Anxiety Attacks, Depression, Gen, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-17
Updated: 2015-07-17
Packaged: 2018-04-09 19:33:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4361525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nigiyakapepper/pseuds/nigiyakapepper
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is the Year 358 and winter is almost upon Valnon. A man of unfortunate circumstances chooses to end his own life in a final attempt to break free of his own darkness.</p>
            </blockquote>





	symptoms of madness

**Author's Note:**

> "So now we see how it is  
> This fist begets the spear  
> Weapons of war  
> Symptoms of madness  
> Don't let your eyes refuse to see  
> Don't let your ears refuse to hear  
> Or you ain't never going to shake this sense of sadness"
> 
> \- [Hold You In My Arms](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mk9wK8CC0fQ), Ray LaMontagne

_He wakes up to a dark room._

_By the brightness of the moon outside, the chill of his sheets, the ache in his back, and the pounding of his head, he’s barely gotten probably two hours of sleep. His shoulders are tired and heavy; his body would appreciate going back to sleep, but he is undeniably, damnably awake._

_Eyes wide, he takes in the shapes in his room. The shadows are familiar. They should be. He knows they should be but his mind is rejecting the thought. Cold seeps upwards from his belly, from the top of his back and spreads out into his chest, his arms and fingers, arresting movement and stealing warmth._

_He presses his thumb into his palm, the gesture instinctual, and feels his skin go clammy. His breathing hitches, all the heat rushes behind his eyes and pools there, his arms are starting to shake._

_It’s happening again._

_Minutes later, Rey is pushing his beaded curtains aside and clambering onto his bed, whispering words of comfort and gently prying open the tight ball he has curled into._

_“Sssh, sssh. Eothan, I’m here.”_

_Eothan gasps, as if hauled up from drowning and finds his heart going helplessly fast. His vision swims and for a terrifying moment he wants to scream_ O Heaven help who’s holding his wrists? _but he sees Rey’s face, features turned down with concern._

_“I’m here.”_

_“Rey—“_

_Whatever he wants to say dies with a wet burble in his throat as Rey meets him in a fierce embrace and a face-full of gold hair. He smells of fresh bedclothes and paper and charcoal with a chemical twinge of paints. It calms Eothan down, if only for a moment, before a dam breaks within him and he is muffling sobs into the crook between Rey’s neck and shoulder, gripping his shirt tight enough to tear._

_“I can’t do this—“_

_“Eothan—“_

_“I_ can’t _—“_

_Rey’s heart sinks as he tries to ease the trembling of his best friend, running his hand up and down Eothan’s back in broad strokes, his shoulder already wet with tears. The beaded curtain hanging over the doorway clinks again and Rey looks up to see Pytir, white hair mused from sleep but clearly awake and no less worried than he._

_The Lark’s shoulders sag at the sight of both of them. He crosses the room and joins them on the bed. Eothan opens his arms to him without looking up and wraps them both in a tight embrace. Pytir rests his head on Eothan’s shoulder in his own gesture of comfort as they wait for their Dove to exhaust his sorrow for the evening._

_“You should go back to bed,” Eothan says after several measures, voice shot and swallowing thickly, looking up from Rey’s shoulder eyes swollen and face wet. “You have to be up early.”_

_Pytir shakes his head with a soft smile and runs a hand down Eothan’s back as well. “Not with you like this. When was the last time you’d gotten a good night’s rest?”_

_Eothan sniffs. He lets a huff out his nose in mockery of a laugh. “I can’t remember.”_

_“Then I’m not going to bed until you’re alright.”_

_Eothan draws in a shuddering breath and presses the heels of his palms into his eyes until stars erupt behind his eyelids. He shifts in his sheets to make room for his Songbirds, and Rey and Pytir settle more comfortably beside him, wordless but reassuring, hoping to dispel their Dove’s night terrors as they’ve done for several times before._

_Eothan’s anxieties have become a discomfiting companion over the recent years. As the end of his term drew closer, so did the press of some unnamable weight that plagued him daily. The sullen nature Eothan naturally had to him had seemingly come alive to consume the energy of whatever his shadow touched. The skin under his eyes had the color of bruises, and the rest of him had taken on a constant nervous pallor. He had very little to say to anyone. Many of his afternoons were spent under the Wing’s tutelage. His Hour was perhaps the only time when people saw him about the Temple, looking like the ghost of his former self—the Temple’s grumpy, inadvertent source of joy after being deprived of a Dove’s blessing for three hundred years._

_They say he was going mad, from muttering to himself about ‘never fitting’ to standing in front of the dais hours before Evensong, staring at the stone as if he were made from it himself before lashing out in a brief fit of frustration, but never to anyone living. People who actually had mind to speak to him only said he was simply tired, not unkind or losing grip on reality._

_But stories are stronger and faster than truth._

_Many knew he either slept too much or not at all, preferring to consume nothing but a round of soft black bread and several cups of tea for days on end, before bingeing on sweets and throwing them up later in the privy. Heron would scold him for it—“You are not a child anymore! I expect better behavior befitting your title!”—which only seemed to make things worse. He continued to compose brilliant hymns, often in fevered frenzy like an artist slapping his anger out in paint. He only came alive whenever he sang Evensong, always clear and pure and full of heart, and people would remark in both wonder and relief they did not live the life of an encumbered musical genius—the Second Dove, the next Wing, the next powerful man to move Valnon._

_Eothan can hardly care about rumors, far too wrapped up in his own head and worrying himself sick with trying to fulfill everyone’s expectations. Rey and Pytir would like to think they know better, but even as they listen and try to ease the anxiety fizzing constantly under his skin, they could not hope to lift the phantom burden from their Dove’s shoulders, or even make him share it._

_The tune Eothan sings is always the same—night after night, with increasing apprehension, and neither Lark nor Thrush understand it more than when they first heard it._

_“I can’t do this,” Eothan says, calmer, hushed. Still close to tears._

_“Says who?” Rey asks gently, taking his friend’s hand in his own and squeezing. “You are a brilliant Dove. You’ve done a lot to bring Valnon more joy than she’s seen in years. The Wing is proud to have you as his successor, and if Saint Alveron were alive, he’d be proud of you as well, I’m sure.”_

_Eothan stares at his sheets unseeing, tears slipping once more from bright blue eyes before he laughs hollowly at the realization that he is crying once more. “I want them to be proud of me. I really do…but I can’t…”_

_He is in danger of retreating back to where they cannot reach, and Pytir catches him before he does. “Please tell us why you can’t, Eothan.”_

_The Lark’s heart goes out to him when Eothan shakes his head, looking so, so lost. “I can’t sing Evensong.”_

_Rey sputters. “B-but you’ve been doing it for years! What do you mean you can’t sing Evensong?”_

_Eothan looks at him, face clearly longing for him to understand, “It’s not mine to sing. I just know it…” His limbs start to shake again, tears falling unbidden. “I’ve always known it. It was never mine like they want it to be. I don’t want…I_ want _to be what they want me to be, so badly. But I just can’t…I don’t want to tell him that I_ can’t _…”_

_He’s lost them again._ The ramblings of a madman _, Rey and Pytir can’t help but see the grain of truth in the rumors as they exchange helplessly confused looks. They only hold him tighter, and pray to the Saints their Dove doesn’t fly somewhere they cannot reach._

_“You’re not alone, Eothan,” Rey whispers, taking him into his arms again. Seeing his best friend break once more under the weight of something he is powerless to take away has left him far from unaffected, his own voice shaking and tears intermingling with the other boy’s. “Please don’t think you’re alone.”_

_Panic once more rises in Eothan’s system, and he sobs himself hoarse on his Lark and Thrush, until exhaustion finally pulls him to sleep just before sunrise, and Pytir is loath to part with them if not for Dawning._

 

 

 

That was three weeks ago, Eothan thinks.

He’s slipped out his room in the dead of night, taking passages devoid of Laypriests and Preybirds to climb the Temple tower, slip out the ornate windows and sit on the rooftops to gaze at the stars. Barefoot, clad only in his sleeping garments with the lightest blanket to carry draped around his shoulders, he takes in the sight of Valnon in the evening.

She is truly too beautiful for words. Perhaps a song may do her justice, but Eothan would rather enjoy the silent evening uninterrupted and by himself. Quaint trails of warm street lamps lit for the night wind their way from the Temple down to the buildings and homes by the shore, tapering to a faint orange glow reflecting off the black surface of the sea made by more lights from the Undercity. Docked boats of varying sizes litter the perimeter of the island, and some are scattered farther off into the ocean, anchored and lit like a poor mirror of the stars spilling white sprays overhead. He breathes in the brine of the sea and feels a measure of peace.

Love is not a word he thinks of often with Valnon, but at this moment, it is foolish to deny it. Eothan loves his city. He loves seeing her at night, in the day, and the hours in between. He would want nothing more than to be able to simply sing for her until the end of his days. His gaze turns to the far off line where the sky is swallowed by the sea and feels the pull of wanting to be more than his body, borne by the wind outside the limits of his flesh and spread thin into the night sky, to see all of Valnon and the Queendom, the lands and seas unknown beyond, to be only music and nothing else.

He stays on the rooftops for a while, mind blank before he sees the sky color from deep blue to a murky orange. He sighs and feels a strange sort of acceptance settle in his belly as he stands to carry out the day with a careful sense of purpose.

 

 

 

Pytir jumps as his bedroom doorway chimes with gentle sound and Eothan appears, face neutral.

“Can I be the one to help you dress today?” he asks.

Pytir releases a breath and takes his Dove’s face in both his hands. “You didn’t sleep again?”

Eothan closes his eyes and holds his friend’s hands where they are. “I couldn’t.”

“Go to bed, Eothan!” Pytir laughs, gently pulling away to prepare himself for his Hour. “You’ll need it. It’s the last day of our term.” He sits himself on his dresser and proceeds to paint his face one last time. “You’ve never missed Dawning. I’m sure Saint Lairke would forgive you if you did just this once.”

Eothan leans by the wall next to him and rummages through Pytir’s tribute box, selecting jewelries for him to wear. “All the more reason I shouldn’t. It’s the last time you go on the dais, Pytir. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Something in his best friend’s tone stops Pytir’s kohl brush halfway across his cheekbone. He turns to look at him.

“Eothan…”

His Dove huffs, something like an amused chuckle, before moving to get his Temple Dress from his trunk.

 

 

 

Despite the early hour, the Sanctuary is packed, and the Temple expects it to be for the rest of the afternoon up until evening. There’s excitement in the air, felt from the most humble Temple-goer to the flock boys to the Laypriests and Preybirds, prompting them to go about the day’s preparations with more flair than usual.

Even Eothan himself seems cheered. After Dawning, he helps Pytir off the dais and they wake Rey together, eating a full breakfast tray much to the surprise of the kitchen staff. They help Rey dress for Noontide, and help him afterwards, talking about aimless things, swiping a honeycake or two from the kitchens, and even cracking a few jokes with hushed smiled and conspiratory giggles, much like when they were younger, with less cares and responsibilities.

The day is extraordinary in its normality, and Rey could almost feel optimistic as he helps Eothan prepare for his own Hour. His platinum collar is polished, pearl shining a creamy pink-white. His drape is freshly laundered and a few inches of the hem pool elegantly by his feet. His stands tall, confident, and relaxed—better than they’ve seen him in days. Rey thinks of sketching a portrait of him tomorrow, a better version of the drawings in his notebook.

Peaceful quiet settles amidst the three of them. The setting sun bathes the Temple corridors a gentle orange glow.

Eothan turns to regard himself in the mirror, dressed like he has done every day. He turns to regard Pytir and Rey standing behind him, expectant, proud smiles on their faces. His blue eyes go soft, framed by the intricate pattern of kohl marking a full twelve years of service. His heart aches at the sight of them, and there’s a thrum of song just beneath his sternum as he struggles to express just how much they mean to him.

“Thank you,” Eothan says quietly, taking both Pytir and Rey in each arm for a hug. He cards his hands through their hair as they squeeze him back. “Thank you…”

Just as Eothan starts to pull away, the chill of fear seizes his legs and makes his knees buckle. He gives a shaky laugh and steadies himself on his friends.

Both the Lark and the Thrush cannot help but begin to feel a small amount of alarm.

“Eothan?” Rey asks. “Are you o—“

“I’m scared.” It’s a whisper they barely hear.

Rey stares wide-eyed at Pytir who stares at him right back over the curls of Eothan’s messy hair. “Scared of what?” He’s almost afraid to know.

Of what indeed, Eothan thinks. He probably hasn’t thought this through. Will it hurt? Will it be quick? Will he struggle through a brief spell of unbearable pain before finally being granted rest? He shakes his head.

“I love you both, you know.” Tears have slipped from his eyes once more, but he takes care not to smudge his kohl. Eothan looks up at Pytri and Rey and smiles.

It’s the brightest one he can give both of them, despite his arms starting to shake. He cannot lie to his Lark and Thrush, he realizes as he watches their expressions morph from confusion to worry. He departs for the Sanctuary, friends trailing in his wake.

His skin breaks out in gooseflesh, barely keeping himself from breaking out into a run for the dais. It’s almost his final hour. Eothan steps onto the stone and turns to glance back at his fellow Songbirds.

“Eothan!” Rey calls before the dais shudders upward.

 

 

 

People by the coast are in awe. They’ve never seen anything like it.

“Even the sea-gods must consider this an auspicious day,” the fishermen remark. How else can you explain the tides receding so low that even the tallest spires of Hasafel sunk beneath the waves glint in the light of the dying sun?

Most of the citizens of Valnon are gathered at the Temple to hear the last Evensong of Eothan’s term, but a number of them litter the streets, peering out the windows of their homes or from the Undercity to see the phenomenon, or at least make sense of it.

“Is that the sea going down?”

“Have you ever heard of anything like this happening before?”

“I haven’t! But it must be a good omen. There might be a chance of casting the nets farther off tomorrow!”

“Saint Alveron must be shining his blessing down on this Dove.”

“That he is.”

 

 

 

Past the first few measures of Evensong, Eothan feels it. A glow deep within him that’s foreign and sits uneasily in his gut. He tries to pound it out with the earnest desire to be the Dove his city needs, to redeem himself if only one last time. As if his body answers out of spite, his voice thins for a moment before swelling back into proper chords, and whatever divine intervention the Wing thought Eothan could wield slips from him like a rug from under his feet, leaving him unsteady and bordering on panic.

He is facing his darkness once more. The faceless shape of Evensong  spreads out before him, a dull glow far from what Doves are promised, but Eothan sees it all the same.

Past the outlines of the city he loves so much, past the ruins of Hasafel, the earth far deep beneath the waters has shifted terribly, and the sea is rearing to repeatedly strike the shore in ever increasing bursts of powerful waves.

He doesn’t understand it. It’s a fate too cruel he could almost cry if he isn’t feeling so laughably helpless. He wants to call out in warning, but all he can do is sing and hope against odds that Heaven would somehow choose to intercede through him. He closes his eyes against the first crash of waves, dashing shipping vessels against the rock, and the screams of people caught unawares.

He sings.

He closes his eyes against the rumbling beneath his feet, the first signs of danger that no doubt has reached the citizens gathered at the Temple. They should flee to safety, to higher ground. The sea is coming in.

He sings.

He closes his eyes against the unsettling calm that rests on his shoulders, like friends who have placed their hands on him in silent companionship. His darkness speaks to him again like it has every night, calmly.

_You are no Dove._

He sings.

Through the dull glow of Evensong, he sees the waves rise higher into the city, relentless and powerful, pushing everything from empty wagons to broken debris from houses to people running upwards through the twisting streets, stumbling under fallen wood or their own two feet and sinking into the increasingly solid waves, or becoming crushed against rock and other things that could not be moved by the water. The screams reach him.

He sings.

Not without the same calm resignation that blooms in his chest and spreads throughout his arms and legs like poison. A numbing poison, one he’s grown terribly familiar with in the recent years.

_You can save no one._

_I can save no one,_ Eothan repeats. Oddly, the admittance is liberating, if not in a pitiful sort of way. _Worthless. Useless._

He has known this all along. This is not new to him. So why is he crying?

He opens his eyes and sees a figure at the balconies on the highest level of the Sanctuary, shrouded in the deepest reds and standing proud.

Eothan smiles at the Wing of Valnon through tears.

A powerful force rocks the city—a quake that has caused the sea to rise and has raced towards the city intent on leveling it to the ground.

_I can’t,_ he admits, and he is calm.

He hopes for rest.

 

The glass shatters as the Sanctuary contracts. A sickening thud joins the last echoes of Evensong, before screams fill the air.

Many things happen at the same time. The prentices come running into the hall, bearing news that water is rushing into the city. The Godswords are already at work guiding the citizens to the safety of higher ground. People seated in the Sanctuary are simultaneously rooted to their seats or trying to hop over them to escape the growing madness. Anyone who has only then barged into the hall to meet the din of both panic and stupefaction joins the Temple Birds to stare in disbelief at the body at their feet, blood spreading outward to soak between the mortar binding the marble flagstones.

The light in Eothan’s blue eyes dies as the last notes of Evensong leave his pallid lips.

“There is no time!” a voice so terribly shaken and human releases them from their spell and sets time running back to speed. The Wing of Valnon pushes past the crowd, out of breath, two horrified-looking Laypriests behind him.

“ _Please!_ ” he says, and no one knows if it is to himself, to Eothan, or to the Preybirds, but it sets them in action.

“Escort everyone to higher ground!” Heron bellows. “Quickly!”

The Wing scoops Eothan’s limp body with much more strength than people thought to give him credit for and heads for the upper floors without another word. The two Laypriests by his side call out in a language unknown to them, but it sounds much like a warning not to do something rash.

“Rey?” comes Pytir’s voice, the Lark peering at his Thrush’s shock white face whose gaze hasn’t left the darkening pool of red on the floor. Pytir’s vision blurs with tears and he hasn’t even realized he’s grabbed hold of Rey’s hand when they watched Eothan fall. “Rey please…”

The Thrush collapses to the floor, taking Pytir with him, eyes still wide and unseeing. “Pytir…”

“Rey don’t—“

“Did he—“

“ _Rey._ ”

“Did Eothan really—“

“ ** _REY!_** ” Pytir shouts, and he rarely does, because Rey finally turns to face him, expression nothing but disbelief. The Lark is shaking. His legs won’t move but he knows they have to get away from here. Away from the _spot…_ “Rey please, we have to go,” his voice is barely a whisper, a plea inaudible past the thundering footsteps of the chaos happening all around them. Water has reached the Temple gates and pushes steadily but persistently past the gardens.

Pytir tugs at Rey’s arm. _“Please.”_

Rey wills himself to stand. There’s a feeling in his chest not unlike a gaping hole.

His feet move toward the exit. Function. _Function._

Soon he and Pytir are running toward the direction the Wing took. Absurdly, there is music coming from one of the practice rooms, opposite the direction of where the citizens are taking refuge. Blindly, Pytir and Rey push open the door and are met with Heron, Rook, Cormorant, and Gull looking sick to their stomachs. Eothan lies strangely grey on a long wooden table, still in tarnished armor and silhouette unnaturally twisted. The Wing stands by him, unreadable behind his mask of red save for his imperceptible leaning on the Laypriests beside him, odd looks of warning still etched on their faces. They seem to be the only force holding up the Wing right now.

Rey kneels beside him and takes Eothan’s limp hand in his shaking ones. For reasons unbeknownst to him then and in the future, he takes his beloved sketchbook, flips to a blank page, presses the bloody hand there, and lets go. Pytir comes to him and puts a hand on his shoulder as Rey stares at the page.

It is hand that held them, that embraced them, that carded through their hair in a gesture of love and gratitude. The hand had been alive barely an hour ago. He looks up at Eothan’s face and sees his eyes have been mercifully closed. The Temple Physician is pulling a shroud over him.

Heron hauls Rey and Pytir to their feet, and the Preybirds dazedly leave the Wing to his mourning. The heavy oak door clicks shut and the noise of the Temple rises to meet them. _Function._

Absurdly, there is still music, an inescapable buzzing in their ears, providing no comfort as they go through the motions of establishing order. The tune runs through their frames the the scrape of nails against rock, raising the hair on the napes of their necks. There distant moans of a man devastated by loss barely audible over the noise of the people.

The Godswords are on high alert in case the quake is followed by more, but it seems that the waves finally stopped. People that had clustered to balconies sturdy and whole enough to hold their weight let out cries as they looked on the rest of Valnon and found no lights, only a cold evening lit by unforgiving stars.

 

 

 

The sunrise that follows the next day only shows them how much was destroyed, how many had died, how momentous the task of repair is to be. The water had seemingly pushed everything inland, from debris to vehicles and items no one thought water could carry, and the quake in turn had left deep gouges of open rock in the streets. Had the people not gathered in the Temple to hear the last Hours of the Songbirds, many more lives would have been claimed by nature’s wrath.

Eothan had been cleaned, dressed, and laid on his bier. The Wing had been adamant about not lighting a pyre, a decision no one had the heart to question. His armor was scrubbed and his possessions were kept and stored with an urgency that was a mix of fear and necessity. No one had the time to mourn, not when Valnon herself needed to recover, and mourn so many other deaths. Rey and Pytir don’t know whether it is a blessing or misfortune.

The next several weeks are busy. Eothan is laid to rest deep within the catacombs. People see more Godswords, prentices, Preybirds and Laypriests than the Wing, all together cleaning, building temporary refugee stations, baking bread and cooking soup to provide to those who have lost their homes and have nothing to eat. Absurdly again, there is music still, eerie and uneasy, always just beneath the noise and source indiscernible. There are idle debates whether or not the Temple would hold Canticles this year, but mostly, more than the physical restoration of their homes and livelihoods, the people need an indescribable sense of healing, still in disbelief about the loss of the first Dove they have had in centuries.

Rey is lucky to be able to sleep when he can, mostly out of exhaustion more than the turn of his body’s clock. Pytir has almost never left his side. He is minutely relieved their terms are over, because he has never seen the former Thrush so quiet, not that the Lark can blame him. He himself has hardly spoken a word, too terrified to face the questions they should have known the answers to.

Why?

What could they have done to change all this?

How can they move on from here, if at all?

 

 

One evening, on his way to the privy, Pytir catches a glimpse of the Wing emerging from a room unfamiliar to him, rounding the corridor looking terribly aged and world-weary. He cannot imagine what it must be like to once more take up the mantle of responsibility one so anticipated to give up to a younger heir. The two Laypriests constantly beside him come up to meet him in urgent strides. Their conversation is low, but Pytir does not miss admonishing tones.

He hardly has time to dwell on the puzzling scene of mere Laypriests admonishing the Wing when he hears it, seemingly deep from within Valnon’s rock, sending an absolutely frigid chill down Pytir’s spine.

 

_Screams._

 

Privy forgotten, he runs back to the room he and Rey now share far from the Songbird’s solar and throws open the door only to find his friend curled into a tight ball, hands over his ears and tears pushing past eyes squeezed shut.

“Merciful Alveron, _make it stop_ ,” Rey sobs weakly, burrowing into Pytir’s arms that came to hold him. The horror of the quake only a few weeks past hit them both like a battering ram. They had heard the screams of people then. Screams of the dying, trapped beneath the rubble, those calling for help, those wailing in mourning. Many spoke of the screams of ghosts, calling out for their loved ones to find them sunken beneath the broken earth and waves.

This is no simple ghost.

Like a shock of discordant notes running through his body, Rey thought of song, unduly ripped from its singer in life and has now stitched itself into the soul in death, vengeful, unrelenting, granting no rest for the one who so longed to be free from it that he chose to take his own life. _What did he do? What did he **do**?! He never asked for any of this! **What did he do?!**_

Screams of grief and terrible, terrible anguish, blending into a grating, nauseating song.

 

Rey knows and when he looks up, Pytir knows too.

 

They would never sleep well again.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I think about Eothan a lot.
> 
> And I am torn between wanting to know his story and being content to leave him shrouded in mystery. Needless to say, I cannot begin to thank LSB enough for bringing this poor boy into the world, along with the rest of her lovely motley crew of gay pirates (at least in Book Two I presume they go sailin', right?)
> 
> Evensong's Heir has pulled me through times I've needed pulling through. And while I honestly have no idea myself why I wrote this fic that seemingly serves to just gleefully poke a stick at an open wound in the hearts of certain Temple Birds, I wanted to get it off my chest? I dunno if that makes sense.
> 
> But to anyone, fictional or real, who goes through depression and crippling anxiety, myself included, I can only say that we have the power to change our lives, if we choose to stay alive.
> 
> More power to this series, the author, and the fandom!


End file.
